She said the album would be "Top 40, radio-friendly, uplifting stuff" hopefully mixing "the pop rock sound of inaugural Idol Kelly Clarkson with the R&B edge of Beyoncé". Sparks has stated that she recorded some songs for the album but the bulk of the recording was done in Los Angeles after the tour was over. All past Idol winners and runners-up are or were signed with the RCA Label Group’s J ( Fantasia, Ruben Studdard), Arista ( Justin Guarini, Taylor Hicks, Blake Lewis) or RCA ( Kelly Clarkson, Bo Bice, Clay Aiken, Katharine McPhee, Chris Daughtry, Diana DeGarmo and idol successor David Cook) labels, with the exception of Carrie Underwood signed to Arista Nashville. On August 17, 2007, it was announced Sparks had signed to 19 Recordings/ Jive Records/ Zomba Label Group, becoming the first Idol to join the label group, the second being David Archuleta the following year. Sparks won the sixth season of American Idol. They should have named it * Venus Eye Trap *. Introducing Joss Stone as a psychedelic J-horror wraith. _ Joss Stone: _ * Introducing Joss Stone * _ Status Quo: _ * In Search of the Fourth Chord *Īccording to legend, the fourth door to the tomb of Tcqutlzopahtzupola can only be opened by two has-beens. The long-awaited new album from Native American Smurf. _ Perry Farrell's Satellite Party: _ * Ultra Payloaded * _ Rodney Carrington: _ * King of the Mountains *.Prince finally fulfills his dream of having sex with the entire planet at once. Like you needed a new reason to hate Ted Nugent. _ The New Pornographers: _ * Challengers *Īnd, here: Is it the lowpoint the guy's complete lack of muscle tone or the "The" strung from the mustache like a bad Farrelly Brothers joke? I still can't decide which is the worst offense: The overdriven nostalgia, the shitty Photoshop job, or Eddie's posture. On some import versions, their heads revert to their original shapes. _ Hayseed Dixie: _ * Weapons of Grass Destruction * Granted, this accurately captures the flaccidness of the music.Īny cover that lists "Eagles" as the artist is a horrible cover. You've been a stalwart independent artist for more than a decade, you have a legacy of uncompromising business and artistic standards, you finally release a retrospective, and you want that image to stand for your career? I'm less put off by the cannibalism than by the fact that he looks like the IT guy who works down the hall. _ David Karsten Daniels: _ * Sharp Teeth * It's the visual equivalent to their skippable opening tracks.Ĭommon apparently found forever airbrushed on the side of a van._ Clap Your Hands Say Yeah!: _ * Some Loud Thunder This guy must be the world's worst puzzle-solver. _ * These are the 20 worst album covers of 2007! * _ Thanks to the Pitchfork staffers who helped with the selections and the quips. So here are the 20 worst of the worst, the lamest of the lame, the embarrassingest of the embarrassing. Also, 2007 was a big year for crappy indie doodles and collages, so we had to cut especially criminal entries by Daddy's Hands, Bill Callahan, Jensen Sportag, Fountains of Wayne, Cloud Cult, and the Fratellis. I, for one, welcome our new digital overlords.Īs usual, we gave (most of the) easy targets a pass, so you won't find Celine Dion, Jordin Sparks, LeAnn Rimes, or Jimmy Eat World below. There was, as always, a lot of horrific examples to parse through this year: poorly Photoshopped pop singers, bad indie drawings, heavy-handed metal concepts, and two (!) Ted Nugent covers. The month of December inspires so much retrospective thinking about the stuff we're most likely to remember that it's easy to forget that there's stuff we'd like to forget.